It starts well ...

Rating: 3/10 (12 December 2009)

It starts well but then, around the 40 minutes mark, starts going rapidly downhill and doesn't recover.
The opening is promising enough - if a little derivative - and it tries to pose some interesting questions about what is going on. But when it finally answers those questions it poses many more interesting ethical and moral questions ... and then ignores them all for the rest of the movie in favour of increasingly over the top action sequences. The film tries to convince you that it has deep questions about the ethics of science and the morality of slavery. And to be fair, it does have these questions - although they are very muddled and never really stated - but what it does not have is any answers. At all. It can't even answer several large plot holes, including some of the dumbest security guards ever committed to celluloid.
So all that remains, as the plot gets off the ride at forty minutes and tells the rest of the movie to carry on without it, are the action sequences. None of which are thrilling or exciting, most of which are derivative, and at least one of which is ... wait, this is a Micheal Bay film. That's the best way to sum up the action sequences; it's Michael Bay. If you like his action movies, my advice is to fast forward the first forty minutes and then start watching for some average action but no thrills. If you're looking for a movie with smarts, or with a plot, or even a movie that fakes them, look elsewhere.